you. Unnerving you, maybe. Offending you – no. I just had a terrible steak. I left most of it and, for some goddamn reason, a large tip too. I’m going to my room. Come use the phone from there.’
Finty didn’t think twice about following him into the elevator. But she did think of Brett. Fleetingly. And then she remembered the peanuts and the waitresses to whom he could wink, and she knew he’d be OK. For the meantime, at least.
‘I’m Finty,’ she introduced herself before disembarking the lift on the sixth floor.
‘And I’m George,’ the American said. They shook hands and he led the way to his room.
Rooms. The American had a suite.
‘Are you drunk?’ he asked.
‘No,’ Finty rued.
‘Hungry?’
‘No.’
‘Want to make that call?’
‘Please.’
‘Would you like a gin and tonic? And some room service?’
‘Yes please.’
‘Dial 9 for an outside line.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Hullo?’ Polly answers the phone. Finty can hear singing in the background. She knows it is Chloë doing her Gloria Gaynor. She can almost see Sally collapsed in a fit of giggles on the couch. She can envisage Polly sitting cross-legged on the floor with the telephone crooked under her chin while she rolls a joint.
‘It’s me again.’
‘Finty!’ Polly trills. Suddenly, the other two join her in a wonderful, if dissonant, chorus of ‘Finty McKenzie! Finty McKenzie!’ The volume is such that Finty holds the receiver away from her ear and the cacophony wafts into the room much to the delight of George.
‘Are you having a lovely time with Brat?’ Polly asks while Chloë in the background hisses, ‘Brett! It’s Brett.’
‘I’m not with him any more,’ Finty says. ‘I’m with George, in his hotel room.’
There is silence. She hears Polly repeat her last sentence verbatim, but with dramatic full stops between each word, to the other two.
‘Who the fuck is George?’ she can hear Sally gasp.
‘Where the fuck is the hotel?’ she can hear Chloë implore.
‘Are you OK?’ Polly says, suddenly sounding sober.
‘Ish,’ says Finty. ‘Can you come and get me?’
Sally, Polly and Chloë stare at each other. They are in Richmond. Not so much drunk as utterly sozzled and somewhat stoned to boot. They have a friend in need holed up in a hotel room with a man called George and a boyfriend called Brett in the bar beneath. The information is too much to digest, let alone act upon.
‘Finty,’ says Polly.
‘George,’ says Sally.
‘We need a cab,’ says Chloë.
Finty replaced the receiver and became engrossed immediately in the chintz of the curtains because it seemed like a safe place to be; lost in the swirls and details of something other than her own life. She was vaguely aware of someone unfolding her clenched fist and placing a glass in her hand, a plate on her knee; of someone stroking her hair and patting her shoulder. When the hand was removed, her shoulder felt chill and so she reached for the hand and placed it back there. She hadn’t the energy to swallow down the lump in her throat, or the wherewithal to prevent a large fat tear glazing and stinging her eye before oozing itself out to splat against the glass in her hand. The noise brought her back to the present.
‘Spoiled,’ she said quietly.
‘Hey,’ said an American voice soothingly.
‘But I have,’ she shrugged, as if it was a fait accompli. ‘I’ve spoiled his evening, your evening, their evening. And my own.’
‘Horse shit!’ George protested. ‘And bullshit!’
‘But the Gathering,’ Finty stressed, ‘it’s sacred. I turned it down for a man with a penchant for peanuts and the ability to make my nose itch.’
‘Well, hon,’ George said after a thoughtful slurp at his glass, ‘I guess you won’t be doing that again.’
‘A Man Called George!’ Sally proclaimed to the concierge, giving the counter an authoritative tap. ‘Please.’
The concierge bestowed upon her a look of great distaste, followed by a withering glance at Polly and Chloë who were sniggering behind the faux fig tree in the foyer.
‘George Who?’
‘He’s expecting us,’ said Sally, refusing to drop eye contact.
‘He’s American,’ Chloë added helpfully.
‘And he’s wearing plaid,’ Polly announced as some kind of open-sesame password.
‘Hi, I’m George,’ says George, ‘and she’s in there.’
‘Hullo, George,’ Sally says, eyes agoggle at his unexpectedly advanced years.
‘Hullo, George,’ says Chloë, eyes agoggle at the extent of his plaid-clad attire.
‘Hullo, George,’ says Polly, eyes agoggle at the opulence of his suite.
‘Hi, ladies,’ says George, ‘she’s in there. She’s expecting you.’
‘Finty!’ the girls cry with love and sympathy, rushing to embrace their friend.
‘Finty!’ they marvel, looking around and spying two bottles of unopened champagne on ice and platters boasting crustless sandwiches and miniature pastries.
‘Girls’ Night In,’ Finty says, very matter-of-fact. ‘George says we should gather here.’
They all look at George. He reminds Sally of her late grandfather. Polly thinks he must be a fairy godfather and then she thinks she must have had one joint too many. Chloë wonders fleetingly what on earth they are doing here in the sumptuous suite of a kindly stranger at gone 10 p.m. Finty wonders where on earth to start.
‘It all began when my nose started to itch,’ she tells Sally, Chloë and Polly who are gathered about her, wide-eyed and jaws dropped as if teacher is about to tell a story.
‘Champagne?’ George suggests, dimming the lights, opening a bottle and pouring four glasses.
‘Aren’t you joining us?’ Sally asks.
George looks rather taken aback, and clasps his hand to his heart for emphasis. ‘God no! It’s a Gathering. Out of bounds. Girls only. Anyway, I have business to attend to.’
And he leaves. He leaves them in one of the rooms of his suite, furnished with champagne and sandwiches. And pastries. And warmth. He leaves the girls, who are now giggling, wrapped around each other on a capacious settee. He has work to do.
The bar is still full and Brett is exactly where George last saw him and where Finty left him over an hour ago. Not that he seems to have realized. His winks at the waitress have provided fast-track service for his gin and tonic to have been frequently replenished. He’s thought only fleetingly of Finty because, in the three months they’ve been together, he’s only ever thought fleetingly of Finty anyway.
‘Peanut?’ George asks.
‘Why not,’ Brett responds.
‘Some advice?’ George asks.
‘Why not,’ Brett responds.
‘Don’t date women with itchy noses,’ George